Since the arrival of Jesus Christ Superstar at Sands Theatre this month, audiences have been treated to two Singaporean performers taking on one of musical theatre’s most recognisable roles. Frances Lee and Tabitha Nauser are sharing the part of Mary Magdalene across the Singapore season of the Olivier Award-winning production, which runs from 19 August to 6 September 2026 as part of its international tour.
Their casting brings a warm Singapore presence to an international company whose principal cast includes Luke Street as Jesus, Javon King as Judas, Ethan Hardy Benson as Pilate, Grant Hodges as Caiaphas and Kodiak Thompson as Annas. But while Lee and Nauser step into the same production, their relationship to Mary begins from slightly different emotional vantage points, making this dual casting uniquely compelling.
Beyond the legend
For Frances Lee, Mary Magdalene is both emotional refuge and social outsider.
“In the context of the show, Mary Magdalene is a respite for the audience and for Jesus as chaos ensues for the whole show,” Lee says. “As an icon, she is defined as a sex worker, she is ridiculed for her profession in the beginning of the show, and spends the rest of it proving how she is so much more than that.”
That sense of Mary as someone constantly pushing against the limits of how others see her also resonates with Tabitha Nauser, who is drawn to the character’s emotional interiority.
“To me, Mary is deeply human,” Nauser says. “She loves someone she doesn’t completely understand, and she’s trying to navigate all the emotions that come with that. I think there’s also a quiet strength in her, she doesn’t need to be the loudest person in the room to have an enormous emotional impact.”
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Both actresses are especially interested in how Mary’s relationship with Jesus is often oversimplified. Lee pushes back against the idea that Mary is merely yearning for romance.
“Perhaps in the complexity of her love for Jesus,” she says, when asked where Mary is most misunderstood. “I think most people assume she is pining for his love, but I do not see it that way. I think she is lamenting the fact that she even fell in love with him in the first place and what it means for her, and how it will change her life. She has always known that their relationship could never be that, and so she needs to grapple with those emotions on her own.”
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Nauser, who took on the role of Mary during Gala night, likewise sees Mary’s emotional life as far more layered than conventional readings allow.
“I think she’s misunderstood when her love for Jesus is reduced purely to romantic love,” she says. “I see it as something much more layered, there’s love, admiration, tenderness, fear and this deep need to protect someone she knows she ultimately can’t protect.”
A role with history
Featuring music and lyrics by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, Jesus Christ Superstar tells the story of the final days of Jesus through the eyes of Judas Iscariot. Told entirely through song, the musical explores the relationships and struggles among Jesus, Judas, Mary Magdalene, the disciples, his followers and the Roman Empire.
The score includes enduring songs such as “Superstar”, “I Don’t Know How to Love Him” and “Gethsemane”. Originally released as a concept album, the musical opened on Broadway in 1971 before its London production opened the following year and ran for more than eight years.
This production was reimagined by London’s Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre and is directed by Timothy Sheader, with choreography by Drew McOnie. The creative team also includes designer Tom Scutt, lighting designer Lee Curran, sound designer Nick Lidster and music supervisor Tom Deering.
The production won the 2017 Olivier Award for Best Musical Revival and the 2016 Evening Standard Award for Best Musical. It has also played acclaimed runs in London and toured across the UK, North America and Australia before arriving in Singapore.
Making Mary their own
Playing Mary Magdalene means entering a role already loaded with audience expectation. For Lee, that pressure is part of the appeal.
“That’s the beauty of it,” she says. “Mary Magdalene speaks to so many people, including myself. Everyone has a favourite, and they are all different for everyone because of how layered and complex her character is. So I connect with Mary Magdalene’s story by merging hers with my own, and creating something new and honest.”
Nauser took a different route, choosing not to overthink past interpretations.
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“I actually tried not to think too much about how Mary has been played before,” she says. “I started with the lyrics and asked myself what Mary is thinking and feeling in each moment. Once you make those emotions truthful to yourself, the character naturally starts becoming your own.”
That process also shaped how she keeps the character grounded in the present rather than weighed down by mythology.
“By trying to forget that she’s ‘Mary Magdalene’ sometimes,” Nauser says. “In the moment, she’s simply a woman watching someone she deeply loves move towards something increasingly dangerous. I think if I can make that feel real to me, the audience will feel that too.”
Lee, meanwhile, points to Mary’s emotional depth as the very thing that keeps her from becoming purely symbolic.
“She is iconic because of her emotional depth,” Lee says. “So as long as that shines through it should be fine!”
Stillness in the storm
In a rock opera filled with conflict, spectacle and rising tension, Mary often functions as the emotional centre of gravity. Nauser describes her as a stabilising force.
“I think Mary offers a kind of stillness amongst all the chaos surrounding Jesus,” she says. “So I focus on her connection to him — listening to him, observing him and being present. I think the grounding comes naturally from that.”
Lee hears that same quality directly in the score.
“It is not that difficult — it is written in the music,” she says. “Her songs sung to Jesus or other characters are almost like lullabies. The only time she breaks from that is when she sings to the audience, at her most vulnerable.”
That understanding of Mary as both comfort and witness gives the role a particular power within the production. She is not simply reacting to the action around her; she is absorbing it, interpreting it, and giving audiences a more intimate way into the show’s emotional stakes.
Two Marys, one production
Sharing a role across performance dates brings its own set of challenges, especially in a production of this scale. Lee is frank about the demands of stepping into the part.
“This is a daunting and challenging role, and the rehearsal period and time period is so short,” she says. “It is a blessing to be able to share it with someone else.”
At the same time, both actresses are clear that sharing the role does not mean flattening their differences. Lee sees the arrangement as both collaborative and individual.
“It is a little bit of both,” she says, on whether their performances are distinct interpretations or part of a shared conversation. “We try not to let each other’s interpretation of Mary affect the other, because they hired us for distinct reasons, not to be like each other. But we are part of the shared language of the music, the cast, and the artistic team. We can both exist in the same show, in the same world, very differently.”
Nauser echoes that idea from her own perspective.
“We’re telling the same story within the same production, but inevitably our individual personalities and instincts will colour Mary differently,” she says.
The result is not two competing versions of the same woman, but two parallel readings of a character whose complexity invites reinterpretation.
Bringing Singapore to the stage
Their presence in the production also matters beyond the role itself. Nauser has spent more than a decade building a career across music, television, radio and live entertainment, becoming one of Singapore’s most recognisable contemporary artists.
Known for her powerful vocals and emotionally candid songwriting, she brings a strong pop and R&B sensibility to the stage. Her previous work includes the single “Bulletproof”, her debut EP Things I Should Have Said, and Pangdemonium’s RENT.
That background shapes how she approaches Mary musically and dramatically.
“Music has always been how I communicate emotion, so that part feels very natural to me,” Nauser says. “I’m used to thinking about phrasing, dynamics and even where I choose to pull back vocally to tell a story. With Mary, I’m learning to combine those instincts with actually living the character from one song into the next, which is a challenge in itself.”
As a songwriter, she is also used to interrogating lyrics from the inside.
“Definitely,” she says, when asked if her singer-songwriter background influenced her interpretation. “As a songwriter, I’m always looking for the thought underneath a lyric — why would somebody choose those words at that moment? I’ve approached Mary’s songs similarly, almost treating the lyrics as if they were thoughts she’s discovering in real time rather than words she already knows she’s going to say.”
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Lee, meanwhile, brings more than a decade of experience across Singapore’s theatre, television and music landscapes. A graduate of LASALLE College of the Arts’ BA Acting programme, she is a resident artiste with the Music and Drama Company and has appeared in multiple National Day Parades.
Her credits include Pangdemonium’s Kimberly Akimbo and Into the Woods, T:>Works’ Lush Life, Checkpoint Theatre’s Normal and The Last Bull, and WILD RICE’s Monkey Goes West and La Cage aux Folles, alongside screen appearances in Mediacorp’s Kin, Whoopie’s World and What on Earth?
Together, the two actresses bring very different but complementary performance histories into an international production that places Singaporean talent at the centre of a globally recognised musical.
Why the show still matters
For both actresses, Jesus Christ Superstar endures because it continues to open itself up to new generations.
“I think Jesus Christ Superstar is timeless in the sense that every generation will look at it with new eyes, and a new perspective,” Lee says. “It does not exist in a specific time, it does not feel like it was written in the 70s, it feels like every generation has something to take away from it.”
She also believes the production has particular value in Singapore’s theatre landscape.
“I think any production that sparks conversation is urgent and relevant,” Lee says. “It is also a rock opera, completely different from the usual structure of musical theatre. The songs all work as standalone stories and part of a greater narrative. I think the exposure to different kinds of musicals for Singaporeans can only strengthen our arts scene from here!”
Nauser sees the show’s themes landing with particular force in the present moment.
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“At its core, the show asks really timeless questions about fame, power, belief and what happens when a person becomes bigger than the person themselves,” she says. “I think in a world where people can become global figures almost overnight, I actually think those ideas feel incredibly important to dissect and to have a conversation about.”
She also believes contemporary audiences may be more open to Mary as a contradiction rather than a fixed type.
“I think audiences today are maybe more willing to see the complexity in female characters,” Nauser says. “Mary doesn’t have to fit neatly into being the love interest, the caretaker or the fallen woman. She can be all of those things and none of them!”
Serving the story first
For Nauser, one of the most significant adjustments has been shifting away from the instincts of a recording artist.
“Probably learning that the goal isn’t always to give the best vocal performance,” she says. “As a recording artist, you naturally want something to sound great, so it’s easy to hyperfocus on the musicality, but in theatre, that might sometimes work at your disadvantage. I’m learning to serve the character and the story first, and let the vocal follow.”
That instinct, to prioritise truth over polish, also runs through Lee’s approach. Both performers are interested less in presenting Mary as an untouchable icon than in allowing her vulnerability, uncertainty and tenderness to come through.
Nauser is especially focused on what audiences carry away from the performance.
“I hope they see the person behind the name,” she says. “I want the audience to feel her uncertainty, her love, her confusion, her belief, her helplessness through her and not through what they think they know of the story.”
Lee’s hope is simpler, but no less affecting.
“I hope they find some solace in her presence through an absolute roller coaster ride of a show!”
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